Re: Intel P6 vs P7 system call performance

["J.A. Magallon" <jamagallon@able.es>]

On 2002.12.12 Mark Mielke wrote:
>On Thu, Dec 12, 2002 at 10:42:56AM +0100, Terje Eggestad wrote:
>> On ons, 2002-12-11 at 19:50, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
>> > Terje Eggestad wrote:
>> > > PS:  rdtsc on P4 is also painfully slow!!!
>> > Now that's just braindead...
>> It takes about 11 cycles on athlon, 34 on PII, and a whooping 84 on P4.
>> For a simple op like that, even 11 is a lot... Really makes you wonder.
>
>Some of this discussion is a little bit unfair. My understanding of what
>Intel has done with the P4, is create an architecture that allows for
>higher clock rates. Sure the P4 might take 84, vs PII 34, but how many
>PII 2.4 Ghz machines have you ever seen on the market?
>
>Certainly, some of their decisions seem to be a little odd on the surface.
>
>That doesn't mean the situation is black and white.
>

No. The situation is just black. Each day Intel processors are a bigger
pile of crap and less intelligent, but MHz compensate for the average
office user. Think of what could a P4 do if the same effort put on
Hz was put on getting cheap a cache of 4Mb or 8Mb like MIPSes have. Or
closer, 1Mb like G4s.
If syscalls take 300% time but processor is also 300% faster 'nobody
notices'. 

-- 
J.A. Magallon <jamagallon@able.es>      \                 Software is like sex:
werewolf.able.es                         \           It's better when it's free
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